What Hurts The Most
by HPIsHowIRoll
Summary: A songfic to What Hurts The Most by Rascal Flatts. DracoHermione, as all pairings in my stories are. There's even a happy ending, because I love happy endings. :


_**I can take the rain on the roof of this empty house,**_

_**That don't bother me.**_

_**I can take a few tears now and then**_

_**And just let them out.**_

_**I'm not afraid to cry every once in a while**_

_**Even though going on with you gone still upsets me.**_

_**There are days every now and again I pretend I'm okay,**_

_**But that's not what gets me.**_

****

Draco lay on his bed, listening to the sound of the rain pounding against the roof of the enormous house he had bought a little over a year ago. It had been meant for him and Hermione, he was going to surprise her when he proposed. She had always hated Malfoy Manor, and he had picked this house out with her taste in mind. He never knew if she would have liked it, though, because she'd left him before he had the chance to ask her to marry him.

The memories of it still hurt every day. He tried not to think about it, to present a face that was over her, but it took more energy every day. Everyone told him that his heart would heal with time, but to him it seemed that time only made it worse. Usually, he didn't allow himself to be overtaken by it. He was a Malfoy, dammit! But in the privacy of his vast empty house, away from prying eyes and ears, being a Malfoy didn't seem nearly as important as the cold, empty space next to him in the bed. He let the emotions overtake him and cried until he fell asleep, dreaming of how his world fell apart.

_**What hurts the most**_

_**Is being so close**_

_**And having so much to say**_

_**And watching you walk away,**_

_**And never knowing**_

_**What could have been**_

_**And not seeing that loving you**_

_**Is what I was trying to do.**_

_"Dammit, Hermione, you can't just leave!" Draco yelled as she packed a back, getting ready to leave their shared flat and him._

"_Well, what's the point? What's the point in staying! It's not like you ever let me know you love me! I can't read you, Draco! I don't know what you're thinking or feeling and you never let me in! I can't do that anymore!" _

"_Please, please I'll change! I swear!" She had looked into his eyes and told him that she loved him. She waited for a moment or two, and Draco wasn't sure what to do. He knew that he should reach out to her, tell her how much he loved her, but he was a Malfoy! Malfoy's didn't beg! So he just let her leave. Tears filled her eyes and she turned away. _

It had been a long year since then, and every day he wondered why he hadn't just told her how much she meant to him. What good did it do inside him, with no one to share it with? He had lost the love of his life. Fucking Malfoy pride.

_**It's hard to deal with the pain of losing you Everywhere I go, but I'm doing it **_

_**It's hard to force that smile when I see our old friends**_

_**And I'm alone, still harder**_

_**Getting up, getting dressed,**_

_**Living with this regret.**_

_**But I know if I could do it over**_

_**I would trade, give away, all the words that I saved**_

_**In my heart, that I left unspoken.**_

****

When Draco woke, it was morning. He roused himself from the memories of the dream and got dressed. It was a Saturday. Usually he did his best to avoid people when he could, but today he couldn't. He needed to go into Diagon Alley for some supplies or he wouldn't be eating for a while, and he was dreading it. He arrived at the Leaky Cauldron around noon, which he quickly realized was a bad idea- lunch time on a Saturday and all. And of course, knowing his luck, he promptly ran into one of the last people he wanted to see.

"Hey, Draco!" said a bright eyed, slightly worse for the wear (after the last fight with Voldy-kins) Harry Potter. "How've ya been?" Harry and Draco had become an odd pair of friends during the war, after Draco's parents had died. It seemed that being orphans gave them a common ground. His relationship with Hermione was enough to prove to Harry that he had good intentions. Ron still didn't trust him, and he and Ginny had been pretty amicable until he and Hermione split.

"Eh, fine," Draco lied.

"Sure. Wanna sit? Ginny's on her way, but she's running a bit late. You should be safe for a drink." Harry and Draco had remained friends even after the split, but Harry seemed to have this weird intuitiveness about him and always knew that he wasn't really over Hermione. Suddenly a drink sounded very good, and Draco plopped down.

"So…" Harry continued, "You're not really fine." It wasn't a question. Most people couldn't tell, or didn't care enough to try, that he wasn't ok. Harry saw right through his barriers. He silently cursed letting Harry in to begin with…. Now he couldn't get him out! "You know, she's miserable too. I really shouldn't tell you that, Ginny will kill me, but it hurts me to see her how she is. You should go to her."

"I can't! It's been a year! I can't go back to her now!"

"See, that's the problem with you two. You're both too stubborn to go back and admit you were wrong!"

"Maybe showing her how you feel after all this time is exactly what she needs," said Ginny, having come up to the table unnoticed, "Maybe she needs you to be vulnerable to prove how much you love her. And I know you do. She does too. She just needs you to say it and show it more."

"She would just laugh at me. Besides, Malfoys don't beg."

"Well then stop being a Malfoy and start being a man who doesn't want to lose the love of his life forever, you git!" Ginny yelled.

_**What hurts the most**_

_**Is being so close**_

_**And having so much to say**_

_**And watching you walk away,**_

_**And never knowing **_

_**What could have been, **_

_**And not seeing that loving you**_

_**Is what I was trying to do.**_

****

Draco made up his mind, and left Ginny and Harry to their lunch. Instead of buying all the things he needed at Diagon Alley, he ran back to his house and grabbed the ring he'd bought over a year ago, then apparated to her bookstore in Hogsmeade. He stood for a moment among the hustle and bustle of a Hogwarts weekend excursion and found her beautiful face. She was talking to some kid about a book he'd picked up. Suddenly, Draco was very nervous, playing out all the various scenes of rejection in his mind.

As if she could feel his eyes on her, she turned and saw him staring there. Draco froze, unsure of what to do next. Hermione tilted her head questioningly, then turned back to the kid. Draco suddenly felt a burst of courage- he couldn't lose her for good.

"HERMIONE JANE GRANGER," he yelled at the top of his lungs, "I LOVE YOU WITH ALL MY HEART AND SOUL! YOU ARE THE FIRST THING I THINK OF WHEN I WAKE UP AND THE LAST THING I THINK OF WHEN I GO TO SLEEP! AND DAMN IF YOU'RE NOT STUCK IN MY MIND ALL DAY TOO," he lowered his voice and stepped closer.

"I was an idiot. You should be treated like a goddess, you should be told every second of every day how beautiful you are and how much you are loved. I never did that, because apparently Malfoy pride can be directly correlated to immense stupidity. I was so wrong."

Hermione took a step toward him, but then decided against it and retreated further. He had to convince her that he was sincere! So, he did the only thing he could think of. He made an even further spectacle of himself. If a Malfoy making an ass of himself in public wasn't love, he didn't know what was.

"I will do anything, Hermione, anything you ask of me. You want me to hop on one foot in a circle and cluck like a chicken, I will," and he did so, making the customers in the store laugh hysterically, "Or maybe you want me to profess my undying love for you in a bookstore full of people? Oh wait, I already did that! Anything, Hermione! Anything in the whole world is yours, any embarrassing thing you want me to do, any un-Malfoy thing you want, I'll do it, just to prove that I love you," he paused for breath and looked at her, trying to make her feel what he felt.

"I always loved you, that's all I was trying to do, but I screwed it up! I had all these feelings coursing through me and I was stupid because I thought that you _knew_ they were there. I didn't know I was supposed to show you, but I've realized in the year I've spent without you that I would rather make an ass out of myself every day than spend one without you," he paused once more and noticed that even more people were gathering to watch his exhibition. This would be really embarrassing if she said no. Somehow, he didn't care.

"I guess what I'm trying to say is…" he paused dramatically. Even if he was professing his love, he still had a flair for the dramatic. He pulled a ring out of his pocket and got down on one knee, "Will you marry me, Hermione? Will you fill my days with your beauty and give me the chance to tell you all the things that are in my heart every single day for the rest of our lives?"

For the second time in a year, Draco saw tears fill Hermione's eyes. He was scared shitless. His breath caught in his throat, he thought he was going to throw up. He was sitting there, in the middle of a bookstore, looking like an idiot, and begging this girl to understand how much he needed her. He was so afraid she'd say no. He closed his eyes as she took a breath to speak, waiting for her response. He nearly fell over as she ran into his arms. He opened his eyes and held her close to him for a moment, then pulled her back for a kiss. It wasn't a spectacular, movie kiss that would win awards and be talked about for months afterwards. It was a simple, heartfelt kiss, full of emotion and love.

"So I take that as a yes?"

"Yes, Draco, I'll marry you. But please, never stop saying the things you said today."

"I wouldn't dream of it."

_**That's what I was trying to do.**_

****

And he slipped the ring on her finger.


End file.
